Wild Bill Hickok and the Show Business

Today is the birthday of James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok (1837-1876). After years as a famous law man, soldier, scout and trouble-maker, in 1867 he followed in Buffalo Bill Cody’s footsteps by trying acting on the legitimate stage. To clarify, I am not talking about an outdoor Wild West Show in this instance in either man’s case (although that is what Cody later became famous for.) I am talking about acting in a role in a melodrama play (although usually a play that is an fictionalized version of real life frontier exploits).

In 1867, Hickok appeared in Niagara Falls in a play called The Daring Buffalo Chasers of the Plains. He was reportedly terrible, so this experiment was shortlived. However, starting in 1873, he appeared again with Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack Omohundro in NedBuntline’sScouts of the Plains, and toured with the show for several months. It was while touring with this show that he met tightrope walker, lion tamer, equestrienne and circus proprietor Agnes Thatcher Lake, whom he married in 1876. Within months of getting hitched, Hickok went up to Deadwood to try his luck at prospecting; that was when he was shot in the back by the cowardly “Broken Nose Jack” McCall.

From then on, all of the stage and screen depictions of Hickok would need to be played by somebody else. And he was! Actors who portrayed him on screens big and small included William S. Hart, Charles Middleton, Gary Cooper (sans long hair and van dyke), Roy Rogers, Howard Keel, Forrest Tucker, Adam West (!), Robert Culp,Jack Cassidy, Jeff Corey, Frederic Forest, Josh Brolin, Sam Elliott, Jeff Bridges, Sam Shepard, and Keith Carradine. Some lesser known actors who were identified with the part include: Bill Elliott, who portrayed him in a sries of B movies in the 1940s, and Guy Madison, who played him on the tv series in the 1950s. And that’s a truncated list!

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Published by travsd

Writer and performer Trav S.D. (www.travsd.com) is best known for his books "No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous" (2005) and "Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube" (2013).
He has written for the NY Times, the Village Voice, American Theatre, Time Out NY, Reason, the Villager and numerous other publications. Trav has been in the vanguard of New York’s vaudeville and burlesque scenes since 1995 when he launched his company Mountebanks, presenting hundreds of acts ranging from Todd Robbins to Dirty Martini to Tammy Faye Starlite to the Flying Karamazov Brothers. He has directed his own plays, revues and solo pieces at such venues as Joe’s Pub, La Mama, HERE, Dixon Place, Theater for the New City, the Ohio Theatre, the Brick, and 6 separate shows in the NY International Fringe Festival. In 2014 he produced and directed the smash-hit "I’ll Say She Is", the first ever revival of the Marx Brothers hit 1924 Broadway show in the NY International Fringe Festival.
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